Overview of Spells

I thought it might be entertaining to write an overview of the colleges of magic. Since it is a largeish undertaking I am going to tackle it in two parts. So herewith is PART ONE of Faye's guide to Arcanum spells:


CONVEYANCE: Overall Grade: B+

Conveyance has one extremely useful spell, and one absolute must have spell, but is otherwise dead weight.

1) Disarm: Grade F
This is a "why bother?" spell. You can usually kill or incapcitate an enemy by other means rather than waste time with this.

2) Unlocking Cantrip: Grade A
Vital if you can't pick locks, and a timesaver even if you can. Also, once magically unlocked, a merchants chest STAYS unlocked forever - which can come in very hany in certain nefarious moneymaking schemes).

3) Unseen Force: Grade F
Another "why bother?" type spell. Doesn't do enough to be worth wasting an action to cast.

4) Spatial Distortion: Grade D
Well at least this is THEORETICALLY useful. But since most combat occurs at close quarters and is over quickly, tactical maneuvering isn't all that handy. Add to that the fact that the spell will only take you places you could walk (no leaping chasms with it) and its damned near worthless.

5) Teleportation: Grade A+
Once you get used to having this spell you'll never want to play a non-mage again. Saves SO much time and bother its well worth the useless spells you have to take to get it.


DIVINATION: Overall Grade: D+

Pretty much a waste of points. See spells for particulars.

1) Sense Alignment: Grade F
Oh yeah, right, thats really useful. Alignment is pretty easy to tell already, no need for a spell. I haven't ever seen this be genuinely worthwhile.

2) See Contents: Grade D
Not really necessary but at least its amusing and can save the lives of the hapless NPCs when you realize you WON'T have to kill them to see what they have in that chest after all.

3) Read Aura: Grade F
Just kill it! Don't fiddle fardle around with this stupid spell.

4) Sense Hidden: Grade C
Well this MIGHT be useful if there were more invisible creatures in the game OR if traps weren't so laughable. But there aren't; they are; and it isn't.

5) Divine Magick: Grade B
AKA: "Identify". Nice spell, but not worth the point wastage to get it when gypsies can do it for you.


ELEMENTAL AIR: Overall Grade: F

This whole school is worthless.

1) Vitality of Air: Grade C
Well it gives you more constitution. Not nearly as useful as the Earth or Fire variants and generally not worth taking an action to perform, but not entirely a waste of a skill point.

2) Poison Vapours: Grade D-
Useless - unless thay have changed it with the latest patch this thing can barely kill rats. Anything worth sneezing at will shrug it off.

3) Call Winds: Grade D-
Another "theoretically useful" spell, but unless you are just wanting to play cat and mouse its much better to cast something else instead.

4) Body of Air: Grade F
You've just rendered yourself almost entirely ineffective! Congrats! And you can't even fly over barriers.

5) Call Air Elemental: Grade D
Well at least it gives the monsters an alternative target.



ELEMENTAL EARTH: Overall Grade: B-

Decent stuff. Unfortunately Earth gets outclassed by Fire in almost all aspects.

1) Strength of Earth: Grade B
More strength = more melee damage. This is good! DOG likes this spell.

2) Stone Throw: Grade B
Outclassed by damage dealers in other schools this is nonetheless a serviceable damage dealer and can damage some inanimate objects that Harm and Lightning can't.

3) Wall of Stone: Grade D
Combat is usually too quick and it is too difficult to position any wall spell properly to get much useful effect.

4) Body of Stone: Grade C
Effective, but there are usually better things you could be doing.

5) Call Earth Elemental: Grade B
Decent fighter but a mana hog. Not really worth the points invested.


ELEMENTAL FIRE: Overall Grade: B+

Contains one bread-and-butter spell and is otherwise quite formidable in dealing damage.

1) Agility of Fire: Grade B
More agility = more speed = more attacks. This is good. DOG likes this spell too.

2) Wall of Fire: Grade D
Combat is usually too quick and it is too difficult to position any wall spell properly to get much useful effect.

3) Fireflash: Grade A
Area effect damage baby! Need I say more?

4) Body of Fire: Grade C+
Like the other "Body of . ." spells there are more productive things you could do. But it look very impressive and deals considerable damage.

5) Call Fire Elemental: Grade B+
The most useful of the elementals, fire deals lots of damage.


ELEMENTAL WATER: Overall Grade: D

Well its not QUITE as worthless as Air . . .

1) Purity of Water: Grade C+
Can help if an NPC is on the borderline of being unwilling to deal with you. Otherwise useless.

2) Call Fog: Grade D-
HA HA HA! This should be an air spell its so useless. Another spell for toying with your prey only.

3) Squall of Ice: Grade C
Area effect damage over time. Sounds good right? Nope. Too little, too slow.

4) Body of Water: Grade C-
See all the other "Body of . . ." spells. Not enough damage to be as good as Earth or Fire.

5) Call Water Elemental: Grade B-
Not as good as Fire or Earth, but better than Air. (Not that THAT says much!)



FORCE: Overall Grade: A

Along with White Necromantic and Temporal one of the three best schools overall. It has a great defense spell, a good single target offense, a mediocre area effect damage spell and DISINTEGRATE. Its only weak spot is a Wall spell. This is probably the best school to Master since the casting cost reduction will make a HUGE difference.

1) Shield of Protection: Grade A
Cheap to cast and maintain and gives great protection. DOG's favorite spell.

2) Jolt: Grade C+
Outclassed by Fireflash in a big way but useful if you don't want to invest points into Fire, or if you have a problem with getting surrounded.

3) Wall of Force: Grade D
Same as the other walls - too cumbersome to be worth using.

4) Bolt of Lightning: Grade B+
Expensive to cast but useful on monsters resistant to harm and fire (Golems in particular)

5) Disintegrate: Grade A+
It may cost an arm and a leg to cast but it will obliterate what it hits everytime unless they have a dweomer or reflection shield up. Also great for getting rid of unwanted doors.


MENTAL: Overall Grade: B

There's only one bread-and-butter spell here but Dominate Will is SO much fun it makes the rest well worth it.

1) Charm: Grade ?
This one seems a bit buggy. It says it is supposed to reduce reactions after it wears off but I have never seen this happen. Also when I force cast it on a member of my party it also seems to raise reactions PERMANENTLY, though who knows what problems this may cause.

2) Stun: Grade B
Fast to cast and well worth it when you really need to put a couple monsters out of battle for a moment while your melee friends deal with something else.

3) Drain Will: Grade F
Waste of time. Just kill it.

4) Nightmare: Grade C
Range and duration are too short to be very helpful but it can be useful when surrounded or to make an NPC you don't want to kill back off.

5) Dominate Will: Grade A
This spell is way too much fun. In combination with the Unlocking Cantrip it makes robbing merchants seem like a stroll in the park.


Well thats it for PART ONE of Faye's Guide to Arcanum Spells. Hope you liked it :smile:

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: FayeValentine on 2002-03-26 05:59 ]</font>

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: FayeValentine on 2002-03-26 06:03 ]</font>

 

*FELDON CHANGES INTO THE JAPANESE FACTORY OWNER GUY FROM THE MICHAEL KEATON MOVIE, "GUNG HO".*

"I rike you. You make me raff."

 

Very good and I can't wait till the next of them come around to see what I think of your ratings. Heres what I have found is the best spell caster for a meelee charecter

Necro white= 3 points. Heal, stop poison and heal more. Thats all you need.
Necro black= 1 maybe 2 Harm and maybe conjur spirit. It helps with some of the quests.
Force = 5 points Sheild, jolt, wall, lighting, disintegrate. This is the field to master in Tulla. It brings the cost down by a half. Disintegrate for all.
Conveyance= 5 points disarm, unlock, unseen, spatial, teleport. Gods quest is cake with teleport and you can go back to the isle of despair if you need to.
Temperal = 5 points. magelock, hasten, congel time, stasis, tempus fugit. The congel time is a life saver. It takes care of the problem of the bad guy running across the creen and hacking you 5 times in one turn. With tempus fugit you can have a full action point bar for you and followers and the bad guys can barley move. I like it.
Fire = 3 points agility of fire, wal of fire, fireflash. Rhings go boom with fireflash.

So thats a total of 23 points. Thats not alot and those are all of the spells you need to be a walking god of arcanum. That leaves 41 to build your charecter with. I got a meelee/dodge/haggle master mage with 18 in st,cn,wp,in,dx at lvl 45. Thats not bad. But thats just what I think

 

Orlon - I agree with you in your choices of the most potent spell schools, though I would take White up to 5 - resurrect is too handy in too many ways to live without.

At any rate, I have just posted the complete overview, which contains all the material in this post so we can now let this thread die a natural death and move any discussion to that thread.

 

Because the COMPLETE Overview is just that. Complete. This overview only has half the spells discussed and I'd much rather see that overview get bumped by discussion than this one. If I'd been a bit faster on the uptake I just would have edited the topic post of this thread to include the other half of the spells but I did not. So PLEASE take any comments there before it slides off the page and all that work goes for nothing.